BALTIMORE (Reuters) – Calls for Medicare government health plans to include coverage for PET scans to additional cancer types have been made.  The medical imaging industry has asked an advisory panel to recommend wider payments.

Data has shown that positron emission tomography (PET) scans went a long way in giving doctors accurate information and allowed them to alter their treatment plans for nearly one-third of their enrolled patients.  The way PET scans work is that radioactive sugars are injected into the body which then travel to the metabolically active parts of the body and can indicate cancer risk.  What the CT or MRI scans miss, the PET scans could pick up due to the unique method of locating possible cancer cells. Read the rest of this entry